Unsainted

Charted: 68120

"Unsainted" finds Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor talking about the depression he has battled for many years.

I'm just weathering a rough patchAnother villain with an itch to scratchDenial is the darkest when you live in a holeWhy does the hell make you feel so cold?

The singer split from Stephanie Luby in 2017 after eight years of marriage, sending him into a depression. Taylor, a recovering addict, wrote the lyrics for We Are Not Your Kind during this time when he was battling depression and trying to stay sober.

Taylor goes on to decry organized religion as a potential remedy for his depression.

Make a move and you pay for itPick a lord and you pray to itYou're so demanding when you want the truthBut your stories don't read for me

The song concludes with Taylor saying he has been "unsainted," meaning some unspecified socio-religious entity destroyed his good side and "killed the saint in me."

The song's intro features the Angel City Chorale, a Los Angeles choir consisting of 160 singers. Shawn "Clown" Crahan and producer Greg Fidelman wanted a lavish introduction; originally they had in mind a children's choir, like in Pink Floyd's "Another Brick In The Wall (part II)," but they ended up getting a regular choir. Taylor told Loudwire it was the last song they finished for the album.

"We had recorded it a couple different times and hadn't really found the spirit yet," he explained. "It wasn't until Clown and [Fidelman] started talking about this grandiose intro with the choir that it was then re-recorded with a little more urgency. It was really cool how it came together."

"I wasn't sold on the choir at first," Taylor added. "They kept referencing The Stones' 'You Can't Always Get What You Want,' which is one of my least favorite Stones songs. It just goes off the deep end of pretense. But what they did with the choir gave me chills when I first heard it. That song was the perfect punctuation mark for what the album was going to be. It was that missing element that we needed for the album."

"Unsainted" was chosen as the theme song for the WWE's NXT TakeOver: Toronto event, held August 10, 2019 in Canada's Scotiabank Arena. Previously, Slipknot's standalone single "All Out Life" was the theme song for the show, which showcases up-and-coming wrestlers.

"Unsainted" was voted the 2019 Song of the Year by the readers of Kerrang magazine. Slipknot was also voted Live Band and Band of the Year, while We Are Not Your Kind came in as runner up for Album of the Year behind Bring Me The Horizon's Amo.

The video, directed by M. Shawn "Clown" Crahan, contains nods to popular landmarks in the band's hometown of Des Moines, Iowa, including seating from the Iowa State Fair Grandstand and an upside-down Iowa Capitol golden dome.